Govinder Nazran (1964 – 2008) was born in Birmingham, but moved to the Bradford district when he was a child. He was one of the six children, and the family had moved to Bradford in 1966 when his father, Kabel, had found work in the textiles industry locally.
Govinder studied graphic design at Bradford College (1980-1983), then at Lincoln Art College for a HND in graphic design, specialising in illustration.
After completing the course with distinction he worked in London and Cambridge as a freelance illustrator, before moving back to Bradford, where he married and settled in Saltaire.
Govinder found work as a designer for a local greeting card company, but moved into photography and became a photographic art director, directing fashion shoots at locations across the world.
In 1993, he returned to greeting card design on a freelance basis, but also worked in his own time on his own artwork designs. In 1999 he decided to go solo and approached Washington Green, the fine art publishers, with a portfolio of his work. They accepted him and promoted his work until his untimely death in 2008. He wrote: ‘My true personality reveals itself through my paintings’.
He became well-known for his animal paintings and sculptures of animals, particularly of cats and dogs, but also of horses and elephants. His first published work was the ‘Cat Walk’ prints, which quickly sold out. Govinder’s animals often came in pairs, representing opposite traits. He said of this:
Many of my paintings are about good and evil – innocence and malevolence. When I was a child I remember believing what a wonderful and happy place the world was. I loved to learn about other people in other countries and wanted to visit them all. Of course, I now realise things aren’t quite as I once imagined, and the once distant places where I so wanted to be are not so far away; they are actually on my doorstep … The world is a place where the innocent pay the heaviest price. It affects me deeply. It’s like living in the garden of Good and Evil. I can’t ignore it, so I depict it in the form of these innocent pictures. I leave it to the individual to look at my paintings and choose what they would like to see, innocence or malevolence – the ‘good’ or the ‘evil’!
Govinder uses solid oil bars directly onto canvas, manipulating the paint with his hands, which becomes more fluid as it reacts to the heat of his fingers. He wrote about his technique:
Composition usually begins life as pure abstract shapes. Flow of line and form, as well as negative shapes, are important here. I also look for connections between shapes and link them with connecting lines. The balance and harmony of colour pull the whole composition together. The end result is part defined and part abstract.
In my ‘pure’ abstracts I look to nature and emotion, and build on that. From life seen through the window of a speeding car, or the blurred reflection of a city seen through bleary eyes, to the depiction of a single moment of intense emotion expressed through layers of paint. It’s a very pure art form.
In 2004 Govinder became the ‘Best Selling Published Artist’ in the industry’s Fine Art Trade Guild Awards and he enjoyed 2 sell-out tours in Japan where his work was highly revered.
He died on December 30, 2008, in intensive care at Bradford Royal Infirmary, six days after a seizure and a fall at his home.